At this point we are
leaning towards Twin Oaks' system of Planners, managers and
input from the larger community in the form of questionnaires
and town meetings. Why reinvent the wheel if the wheel works
well? And if free time is a major goal, we do not want to spend
alot of it in meetings. People may want to experiment with
consensus in smaller groups such as food, art, or other optional
coops.
There are 3 Planners who
make decisions that involve coordinating various community
enterprises, reviewing proposals and community policies and also
budgets. Planners have meetings where other community members
can offer input and they decide by majority (2/3) vote.
Planner's decisions can be contested and subject to a community
vote with a majority being sufficient for a veto. Planners get
selected by previous planners (initially by the core group) and
the community can also veto a planner's selection by an 80%
majority. Planners serve a short term 12-18 months and cannot
serve two consecutive terms. We don't anticipate planners to
meet as often as they do at Twin Oaks (2 or 3 times a week)
because the community affairs will be more limited in our
community (more individual focus). Planners are always open to
suggestions and proposals from members, either informally or
with explicit vehicles such as an opinion and idea (O&I) board.
Because they can be vetoed, they try to always be aware of
community Zeitgeist.
There are at least as
many managers as community enterprises (some enterprises may
require more than one manager). We anticipate the following
enterprises:
-
Vegetables and
grains
-
Animals (chickens
and rabbits)
-
Machinery (mostly
tractors and cars and machine shop tools)
-
Kitchen
-
Culture (aka
communion and transcendence)
-
Building maintenance
-
Home (soap,
toothpaste, etc)
-
New buildings
-
Legal and Tax
-
New membership
Managers should be
experts in their fields. They get selected by a managerial
council by signing up when a managership becomes available. The
council can be selected in the same way by other members of the
council or by community-wide vote (the latter offers a check on
power). All managerial decisions can be appealed by anyone to
the council and council decisions can be appealed to the
planners.
